Neurological complications in Behcet's syndrome

The neurological complications of Behcet's syndrome have not been character ized with clarity. We present the clinical features, imaging characteristic s and CSF findings of a series of 50 patients seen at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery over the past 10 years. In this series, vas cular complications had a low prevalence, whereas involvement of the brains tem was common; spinal cord lesions, hemisphere lesions and meningoencephal itis also occurred. Optic neuropathy, vestibulocochlear and peripheral nerv e involvement occurred, but were rare. The prognosis for recovery was in ge neral good, and the majority of those followed-up over a median of 3 years (range 1-19 years) had only single attacks. One-third of patients underwent further attacks, and four underwent progressive deterioration leading to d isability. Factors suggesting a poor prognosis are repeated attacks, incomp lete recovery, progressive disease course and a high level of CSF leucocyto sis during acute attack. These data should be of help in the further defini tion of the clinical characteristics of this rare neurological disorder and in the planning of treatment trials.